FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT AVANDIA - PAGE 3

* Astra/BMS and Takeda drugs do not raise heart attack risks * Studies also clear Onglyza and Nesina on pancreatic safety * But more heart failure hospitalisations seen with Onglyza By Ben Hirschler AMSTERDAM, Sept 2 (Reuters) - Diabetes pills known as DPP-4 therapies got a mixed safety report on Monday as studies showed they did not raise the risk of heart attacks but might be linked to heart failure, where the heart fails to pump blood adequately. Reassuringly, the medicines were not associated with increased rates of either inflammation of the pancreas or cancer - something that has been a worry in the past.

Q. I'm interested in investing in pharmaceuticals. What is your opinion of GlaxoSmithKline? A. This London-based drug company's shareholders recently voted to reject a $35 million "golden parachute" proposal for Chief Executive J.P. Garnier that would have been triggered if he lost his job under certain conditions. This marked the first time British investors made a decision on extravagant pay. Europe's biggest drugmaker says it will honor the vote results and re-evaluate its remuneration program.

Thomas Spetter Jr. received conflicting messages while being trained as a pharmaceutical sales representative for Abbott Laboratories in the late 1990s, he claims in a court filing. The first message meshed squarely with federal law: Market drugs only for purposes that have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Trainees were then taken to a separate room where the door was closed, and an experienced Abbott sales rep said to ignore corporate trainers' directions and instead market Depakote, an epilepsy drug, as a way to treat agitation associated with dementia, a practice that would be illegal, Spetter alleges in a whistle-blower lawsuit filed in 2010.

Older diabetes patients treated with Takeda Pharmaceutical North American Inc.'s Actos and GlaxoSmithKline PLC's Avandia had a "significant" increased risk of heart attack, congestive heart failure and death compared with those taking a more established treatment, according to a study in this week's Journal of the American Medical Association. The study, published in the Wednesday issue of JAMA, is the latest to call into question the use of diabetes pills known as thiazolidinediones, or TZDs.

Health advisers will convene Monday in Washington to help the Food and Drug Administration decide whether the controversial pill Avandia should remain on the U.S. market, a decision that could create trouble for a Chicago-area drugmaker's best-selling prescription medicine in the same class. Most scrutiny has focused on Avandia since a New England Journal of Medicine study in May reported an increased risk of heart attacks for GlaxoSmithKline PLC's drug, but an official with the Food and Drug Administration said questions could emerge about Actos, a pill sold by Deerfield-based Takeda Pharmaceuticals North America Inc. The safety of Avandia will be the focus of a joint meeting of two Food and Drug Administration advisory panels: the Endocrinologic and Metabolic Drugs Advisory Committee and the Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committee.

A diabetes drug that has been linked to at least 61 deaths was withdrawn from the market Tuesday after a review of safety data showed it was more toxic to the liver than two comparable drugs. The Food and Drug Administration said it requested that Rezulin, a drug for treatment of Type 2, or adult-onset, diabetes, no longer be sold. It said that Park-Davis/Warner-Lambert, the drug's manufacturer, agreed to the action. Rezulin was withdrawn, the FDA said, after a review of recent test data showed it was more toxic to the liver than Avandia and Actos, also are used to treat Type 2 diabetes.

At an unusual meeting convened by the Food and Drug Administration to discuss its March decision to take the diabetes drug Rezulin off the market, doctors warned Friday that patients taking two newer, related drugs, Avandia and Actos, also should be checked carefully for signs of liver trouble. "Watch out, watch out," said Dr. Jules Hirsch, a researcher at Rockefeller University and a member of the expert panel that advised the FDA about Rezulin. "I would monitor them to beat the band."